Naarm/Melbourne

On November 21, up to 10,000 Victorian teachers went on strike, travelling from around the state to fill the Vodafone Arena in Melbourne. Around 150 schools were closed as a result of the industrial action. The teachers are calling for a 10% per annum pay rise over the next three years.

Community concern over the Victorian state government’s plan for a $3.1 billion desalination plant at Wonthaggi is growing following reports that the Labor government is forcibly acquiring properties around the proposed site. The local community and environmentalists have opposed the proposal as being environmentally damaging and the wrong solution to tackle water shortages.

A lot of workers would have been shocked to read the report in the November 14 Melbourne Age about the Australian Building and Construction Commission (ABCC) ordering construction companies to remove union posters and signs and anything with the Eureka flag on it.

Speakers at a meeting of 100 people at the Fitzroy Town Hall on November 15 slammed the “anti-terror” laws.

“These are the worst days in Pakistan’s history”, Ali Khan, a student from Pakistan, told a rally in Burke Street Mall on November 15. The rally was called by Australia Asia Worker Links and the Socialist Alliance to protest the state of emergency imposed by Pakistan’s Army Chief of Staff and president, Pervez Musharraf.

After complaining bitterly about federal ALP leader Kevin Rudd’s plan to keep key elements of the Howard government’s Work Choices laws such as restrictions on the right to strike, the Victorian branches of the Electrical Trades Union and the United Firefighters Union have decided to give substantial support to the Greens in the November 24 federal election. Both unions have constructed big billboards on their offices advocating a vote for Greens candidate Adam Bandt in the seat of Melbourne. The ETU has also donated $20,000 to the Greens.

For two years 13 Muslim men from Melbourne, have been held in Barwon prison near Geelong and nine men from Sydney in Goulburn’s super-max prison without trial.

More than 100 people gathered in the Footscray mall for the western suburbs’ community rally “African refugees are welcome here!” on November 10. The rally was organised in response to immigration minister Kevin Andrews' comments last month that African refugees were “not adjusting”, and the slashing of the African refugee intake from 70% to 30%. The rally demanded an increase overall refugee intake; no cuts to African immigration; and an end to the racist attacks on the Sudanese and African community. The rally was supported by the African Think Tank, Maribyrnong Mayor Michael Clarke, Eritrean Community Association, Sheik Isse Musse from the Virgin Mary Mosque, AfricanOz.com.au and the Socialist Alliance.

The Victorian Socialist Alliance’s lead candidate for the Senate, Margarita Windisch, gave this speech to the monthly meeting of the Melbourne branch of the Maritime Union of Australia (MUA).

On October 31, residents of Wonthaggi — the South Gippsland town that is near the proposed site of the Victorian Labor government’s proposed $3 billion desalination plant — joined environmentalists from Melbourne in a 100-strong protest on the steps of state parliament.

Organisers of the Footscray Racism No Festival have joined forces with the March for Multiculturalism to stage a “Big Day Out Against Racism” on November 17. The day will start with a street march beginning at 1pm at the State Library and participants will then be asked to make their way to the festival in Footscray, starting at 4pm at the Footscray Primary School.

Guy Pearse — the speechwriter for the federal Coalition environment minister from 1997 to 2000 who blew the whistle last year on the Howard government’s use of Australia’s biggest polluters to write its greenhouse gas emissions policy — visited Melbourne on October 24 as part of an east-coast speaking tour.